


Who Was "The Kid"?

by convolutings



Series: Things I Wish Were Said [2]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, BAMF Peter Parker, Canon Divergence - Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Critical of Tony Stark, Dead Peter, Dead Peter Parker, Everyone Loves Peter Parker, Gen, Hurt Tony Stark, Irondad, Mentor Tony Stark, Personal Growth, Peter Parker is only mentioned but it's all about him, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Post-Spider-Man: Homecoming, The Avengers learn about Peter Parker, Tony Feels, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark-centric, Tony wasn't actually a good mentor, but he regrets it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-29
Updated: 2019-06-29
Packaged: 2020-05-30 21:28:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,868
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19411747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/convolutings/pseuds/convolutings
Summary: While recuperating from his trip in space in the med-bay, Tony decides its finally time to tell the team about Peter Parker/Spider-Man. Who he was, what he fought for, what he went through, and how he feels about him. Through his explanation about Peter, Tony comes to grips with the way he treated him, the regret he feels, and what happened. While listening, the team see a side of Tony they have never seen before, that of a protective father.





	Who Was "The Kid"?

**Author's Note:**

> This is really just a recap of Spider-Man: Homecoming through the eyes of Tony. And some emotions and revelations I hope he came to. 
> 
> Part of a series but can be read as a stand-alone
> 
> I own nothing, Marvel owns everything.
> 
> Rated T for language

Tony laid down in the med-bay while he got strapped up to IV bags. He was dehydrated after coming back from 22 days in space after The Snap. Pepper, Rhody, Happy, and even Nebula sat down on all sides of him, surrounding him, while the rest of the team stood outside looking in through the glass. It wasn’t more than half a second before he remembered.

“I lost the kid.” He said. He looked away, afraid that he might break at any moment.

Having come off the ship without him, he knew that they all knew. But he had to say it out loud. And they knew that. They knew that Peter was Spider-Man, and how much Peter meant to him. Not only as Spider-Man but as Peter, The Kid, as he called him.

He knew he had to talk to Steve and the rest of the team. Just because he was happy they were all alive, and the anger was gone, didn’t mean that the past issues suddenly disappeared too. But he couldn’t do that just yet. He was tired. He didn’t just watch Peter disappear, he held him as he did. He could feel Peter’s body trying to piece itself back together, feel the kid in pain, before Peter’s body gave up and he was gone.

_“Mr. Stark? I don't feel so good.”_

He heard it on repeat over and over again in his head. But he just laid there paralyzed.

1 Day

_“I don’t know what’s – I don't know what’s happening. I don’t”_

2 Days

_“I don't wanna go, I don't wanna go, Mr. Stark”_

3 Days

“ _Please, I don’t wanna go. I don’t wanna go”_

4 days

_“I’m sorry”_

He knew that people had been coming in and out of his room, but he didn’t talk. He couldn’t hear what anybody was saying. They were quiet and respectful and giving him time. He didn’t even know if physically he was getting better. All he could focus on were those words.

By day 5 people had apparently had enough. Clint stormed into the med bay, followed closely by everyone else.

“Alright, that’s enough!” He yelled.

Tony sat straight up, being pulled out of his haze. His brain short-circuited, stopping the repeat of those words to focus on what was in front of him. Pepper, Rhody, Happy and even Nebula shot up from their chairs, stepping forward in a protective stance around him.

“Look around you!” Clint continued. I don’t know what happened on the planet, or the ship, but you're here now.” He was getting angry. “It’s been 5 days and you haven’t said a word. We are all struggling here, the entire universe, not just you.” He continued. “I lost my entire family, Steve lost Bucky and Sam, Rocket lost his entire team! You still have Pepper and Rhody and Happy and us, your team, we’re all here! So you couldn’t stop Thanos, well neither could anybody else. You were stranded on a ship, I get that, and it must have been traumatic.” He stopped to look at him to let him know he was sincere about that. “But you don’t get to stop and behave like this when no one else is when you haven’t even lost anybody!”

“But I did!” Tony shouted.

He looked around and everyone was confused. Who else was in his life? They were all looking at each other trying to figure out who might have caused this kind of reaction from Tony. Tony Stark, notorious for his stunted emotional capacity to love. Pepper, Rhody and Happy knew this story, and Tony had even told Nebula about The Kid while they drifted through space. So they sat down first, surrounding Tony again, making sure he knew he had their support, while the rest of the team still stood.

“I lost the kid.” Tony knew this was going to be his breaking point.

“Spider-Man?” Steve asked. “Look I know you must have recruited him for Germany, and we saw him go up with you. But…”

Before Steve could continue Tony interrupted. “His name was Peter. Peter Parker.” He must have had a certain look in his eye because that made everyone find a chair and sit down to listen to what he had to say. He wanted to tell them about the spiderkid. Because whether they fought beside him or against him, everyone could see how strong and energetic Spider-Man was to fight for what was right; and they deserved to know who he was.

“He was only 16.” Everyone realized that meant he was 14 when Germany happened. They were all about to interrupt no doubt to berate him for bringing a child into this war, but Tony got to it first.

“I know he was young. That he was just a kid, practically still a child. He got his powers from an accident on a field trip and became Spider-Man after watching his uncle die right in front of him. His parents died when he was young, so after his uncle died, he only had his aunt left. He wanted to do some good. He had already been Spider-Man for 6 months before I met him. He was wearing a costume made from pajamas and web launchers that he made himself.” He looked up making sure they knew he didn’t do this purposefully to a child.

“He said things like: _‘with great power comes great responsibility’_ and _‘when you can do the things I can, but you don't and then the bad things happen they happen because of you.’_ He just wanted to look out for the little guy and make the world a little bit of a better place.” When he looked up he saw that they were all just as affected by Peter’s words as Tony had been when he first heard them.

“I made a lot of mistakes with the kid. The first one was bringing him to Germany. I just needed bodies; I didn’t know it was going to turn out how it did. He’s a good kid. Smart, genius level smart. Kind and funny. Can't shut up to save his life though. This kid though, there’s no stopping him when he sees something that needs fixing, or a problem that needs solving. Big or small, he is going to try to fix it. It’s just who he is, with or without having gone to Germany. But I shouldn’t have brought him into the big leagues, I know. And I did it all wrong too.

I just showed up at his house making up some lie about a ‘Stark Industries Internship’ to his aunt. When we went to his room to talk in private, I went and made him visibly uncomfortable by calling his aunt ‘hot’ in front of him and then called him out about being Spider-Man, ignoring the fact that he had kept his identity secret for a reason. I shouldn’t have told him I would tell his aunt about his nighttime curriculars if he didn’t listen to what I had to say. Hell, I didn’t even tell his aunt we were going to Germany or tell the kid what the accords were even about.”

Tony stopped, now yelling at himself, “fuck. Fuck. Fuck!” he groaned, “I threatened and kidnapped a kid! He didn’t even want to go, he wanted to do homework. And I forced him into a world bigger than what he wanted to or should have been in. What kind of a person am I?”

The team had realized that too. But the kid was gone now, and Tony was realizing his mistakes, so there was no need for them to pile onto the guilt he was already feeling. Before ‘The Snap’, they probably would have. But that was then, this is now. This was a Tony they had never seen before. So they shut up and let him continue.

“But he looks up to me, so he followed me. He even created this vlog of the trip; I mean he was so excited to be brought into the folds. I think that helped me ignore how I handled Germany since he enjoyed it so much.”

The team recognized that he had been using the present tense. And Tony did too but he refused to use the past tense. So he continued. “Afterwards he would update Happy basically every day on the things he did, savings cats from trees and whatnot, and asking when the next ‘mission’ would be.” He laughed, and they all chuckled a little knowing how juvenile it sounded, but also how determined this kid sounded to be a part of the fight. They realized that even if Tony hadn’t brought him in, this kid probably would have found a way to weasel himself into it anyway. Whether if at first he said he wanted to do it or not. The kid they met in Germany, and this kid that is being described to them is just like them. He wanted to save the world.

Tony kept going, “even though I didn’t say it out loud, I knew I handled Germany wrong. That I shouldn’t have brought him into the big leagues. So I didn’t keep in touch with him afterwards, wanting to leave him out of it. Leave him to ‘help the little guys’ like he wanted to. But ignoring him was probably was wrong too since I brought him into the fight in the first place. But I did let him keep the suit, and I monitored him, because there was something about him, ya know? I wanted to take care of him.” He sighed, taking a breath.

That was when the team realized that no matter how Tony handled Germany, or what he was about to tell them, they would forgive him. Because if this 16-year-old kid had joined the big fight, which by now they knew he would have done; but if he did it without Iron Man having his back, and he had gotten hurt, that was something they wouldn’t be able to forgive themselves for. And Tony protected him or had at least tried to.

While they were thinking these things, Tony hadn’t stopped, presumably because if he did he might not have been able to keep going. “My second mistake was thinking I could be a mentor.” They all stopped shuffling, leaving the room in silence. Recognizing that Tony bringing his self-deprecation into this, meant that this story, this event, this kid, was incredibly important to him, more so than they thought before.

“On one of his patrols, he ran into this guy, Adrian Toomes, called himself The Vulture because he had this pair of wings. Kind of like Sam's, but bigger, scarier and eviler.” He waves his hand dismissing that thought. “Anyway, he was selling alien technology and the kid found out about it and put himself in the middle, designating himself as the one who needed to stop him. But he was a smart kid, he did want to tell an adult, or rather his mentor I guess. So he kept bugging Happy to tell me about it, but I chose to ignore him. Hoping he would drop it so we could take care of it, and he could be a high school student. I should have known that wasn’t going to work.” He cleared his throat, “this guy was dangerous, so when Peter went after him the first time, he ended up getting dropped in a lake and I had to send a Mark to go save him. But even after that, he still insisted that he had to ‘ _get the bad guy.’_ But I responded like an asshole and said to ‘let the big boys handle it.’ I told him this wasn’t big enough for The Avengers, but it was too big for him. Told him to keep helping cats out of trees and helping this woman who gave him churros. These were things he had told me about in his voicemails, so I thought that indicated that I was listening to him. But he didn’t pick up on it, he only picked up on the fact that I said it as if I didn’t respect what he does immensely, which I do. I respect the hell out of him” He pauses.

“Maybe I should be using past tense…” he said mostly to himself, but everyone heard it.

He just continued. “And we were going to handle it.” He looks up to assure them like he should have assured Peter. “And I should have told him that. I should have told him that I appreciated him bringing this to my attention, or that he did a good job, or gave a little more detail to make him confident that we were going to do something. Instead, I dismissed him.

So, of course, he went after Toomes and his men again, but this time he made a mistake. But I handled that situation horribly as well. Looking back, I handled it like my dad. You know that incident with the Staten Island Ferry?” He paused looking up waiting for confirmation. They all nodded, so he kept going.

“He followed some of Toomes’s guys onto the ferry and didn’t trust when the FBI showed up that they could handle it. So he fought Toomes’s guys and the tech ended up splitting the ferry in two. He used his webs and according to the AI that I put in his suit he was 98% successful in holding the ferry together, but that 2% matters, he missed a beam. So it split. He ended up grabbing onto the two ends of his webs that were on either side of the ferry, holding it together.”

He said it with the same shock he felt as when he saw it with his own eyes. At the time though he was too mad to realize how much the kid actually did to try and fix it, how hard he worked. That he was ‘holding the ferry together.’ This realization made him feel even worse for how he reacted. But he wanted to keep telling the story. Not only to tell them about Peter but because along the way, it ended up starting to help him work through certain issues he had been bottling up. “I got there just in time to push the sides of the ferry together and closed it up.

I brought him to a landing and just started yelling at him. My first clue as to how bad a mentor I am should have been when he yelled, starting to cry, saying that if I actually cared I would be there. Because I hadn’t been before, I just sent a motorized Mark. He didn’t have any trust in me because I had given him no reason to. But I stepped out of the armor and showed him I was there, but not to comfort him. I ignored the issue and proceeded to yell at him; about the fact that I had told him to stay out of it, that I was the one who brought the FBI in, and that they were going to handle it, and how instead he made it worse.

But how was he supposed to know that I brought the FBI in? I didn’t tell him. I yelled about the safety of all the passengers as if he wasn’t already beating himself up over it. He apologized but I told him _‘sorry doesn’t cut it.’_

He’s more like me than I care to admit. Guilt complex the size of Titan. He even told me, _‘I just wanted to be like you’_ but all I said in response was ‘ _And I wanted you to be better.’_ I really wanted him to be better than me, _”_ he said with a certain type of sadness.

Tony’s voice had somehow been calm the whole time, keeping his cool to tell the story of Peter. But now he started to raise his voice a little.

“And then I did the stupidest thing I could have done. I took his suit away.” Tony stopped to take a breath and you could feel the regret emanating off of him. “He protested, said that he was _‘nothing without the suit.’_ I had made him feel so bad about the persona, the superhero, that he created, that I made him feel like he was nothing without the fancy suit I gave him. How did I do that? I didn’t want him to have that feeling of not being more than your suit. So I told him _‘if you’re nothing without the suit, then you shouldn’t have it’_ and took it away.” He looked down unable to look everyone in the eyes, the guilt was overwhelming. It was only a second, though, until he looked up again.

“I gave him the suit to give him better protection, to make him safer. Not to make him feel like he was only Spider-Man because of me. I wanted him to remember that he wasn’t nothing. That Peter Parker, the person, was important. To remember who he was without the suit. Be a high school kid, go to homecoming,” he lowered his voice again, “I don't know, whatever it is kids do.” He sighed,

But part of him figuring out who he was, was remembering that he was Spider-Man with or without the suit. After all, he didn’t get his powers from the suit. And he still had the same moral compass, and desire to stop the bad guys. So I should have realized that even taking it away wasn’t going to stop him from going after Toomes.”

Everyone could see that even though Tony feigned annoyance, even a little anger at that fact, it was only out of fear. But mostly he was proud of Peter for not letting ego get in the way of doing the right thing. They were starting to like Peter Parker more and more, both as the person and as Spider-Man.

“I wanted him to go through this process on his own, right?” it was a rhetorical question. “So after the ferry incident, I, what do the kids call it these days? ‘Ghosted?’ I ghosted him. Just like I did after Germany. But I shouldn’t have completely abandoned him. I should have learned my lesson when it didn’t work the first time.”

Happy interrupted. Everyone had forgotten that there were other people in the room as they were all individually focused on Tony and Peter. So hearing someone else’s voice was a bit of a shock. “Actually, I did sir,” he corrected Tony, “I was the one who didn’t answer his calls and hung up on him.”

“At my insistence, though,” Tony replied, looking at Happy, not willing to let anyone else shoulder the blame.

He turned back to everyone, “anyway, he had apparently started to let it go, but then Toomes ended up being the father of the girl Peter was taking to homecoming. Cliché right? And Toomes somehow put together that Peter was Spider-Man, probably because the boy can't hold a poker face to save his life, so he threatened him. So what did Peter do? He ditched his date, put on his old Spider-Man costume, the one that was sweatpants, and went after him.

While he was running after him, he tried to get in contact with me, or rather Happy, through his friend who he called his ‘Guy in the Chair.’ He had found out that Toomes was trying to steal some of the Chitari weapons that were being transferred from the tower to the compound. But we were so busy with the move we hung up before his friend could say anything.”

This is the part that he regrets the most. That if someone told him he could only regret one part of this story; this would be it. Because this was the part that caused Peter to have the nightmares that Tony was trying to save him from.

“Peter caught up with him in an abandoned building, he thought he had him, even berated him that Toomes’s wings were missing him as they flew around the warehouse. But Toomes is smart, and Peter was overeager to prove himself. Toomes was just stalling for time so his wings could knock out the support beams of the warehouse. Peter didn’t get out in time and got trapped, stuck under the collapsed building.”

Everyone sucked in a breath, terrified for this young kid. They don't even know Peter and they feel for him, so they can’t even imagine how Tony felt hearing about it. “He’s all alone, scared, in this dangerous situation because of me.” A beat then, “but like I said this kid is Spider-Man.” Tony smiles, a spark in his eyes and turns to Cap, “I think he actually might be stronger than you because he lifts the entire fucking building off himself, climbs out, and continues to go after Toomes.”

They’re all shocked at this point, though they know they shouldn’t be after everything. But it still shocks them because not only is this kid strong as hell, but he has a resiliency like no one else they’ve seen before. They can see why Tony latched on.

By now there are a few things they all understand.

  1. Tony is in awe of this kid, as he should be.
  2. Tony regrets the way he treated this kid. (So he can actually feel remorse?)
  3. Tony wanted to be a mentor to this kid, who already thought of Tony as one
  4. Tony should have gotten a chance to apologize
  5. Tony loves this kid



Tony kept talking, “Peter followed Toomes and ended up fighting him on the outside of one of my invisible planes, and crashed it on Coney Island, so no one else would get hurt. He continued to fight him even after the crash because Toomes just wouldn’t stop. But Peter won. And apparently during this fight, Toomes almost dies, but Peter saved his life because Spider-Man has never killed, or rather had never killed anyone.”

At this, the team is all the more amazed. They’re all superheroes, but they’ve all also killed. They figured it was a prerequisite. Apparently not. Because this kid, this superhero, had never killed anyone. Toomes, The Vulture, whatever he called himself, he knew his identity, and still, Peter saved his life.

“And this stubborn ass kid leaves a note for Happy to find, _“Found flying vulture guy. Spider-Man. P.S. sorry about your plane,”_ he says with a chuckle. Everyone laughs a little because save for Thor, Bruce and Rocket, they’re now remembering the way he behaved at the airport. They realize the innocence, the enthusiasm, the humor, wasn’t just for show, or from the shock of fighting The Avengers. It was just who he was. It’s then that they realize they might need a little more of that in their lives.

Tony continues, “so of course I offer him a spot on The Avengers B-team because what else is the next logical choice? But, then he declines the invitation to join.” Tony laughs.

“He thought it was a test. Said something about not being ready and wanting to stick to helping the little guy. So I play along and tell him that yes it was a test, so he doesn’t feel bad. But then I'm stuck with a full press room since I was actually planning on announcing him as an Avenger.”

Pepper interjects, “so, of course, it was the perfect opportunity to propose.” They all laugh and look around at each other, man they missed each other.

Tony was still on a roll, “I don't know why the kid thought of me as his mentor, because I really wasn’t one. But he did.” Tony realized he had said one of his mistakes was thinking he could be a good mentor. But it wasn’t a mistake. He just wasn’t ready to really be one yet. He wanted to protect the kid, but it wasn’t until after the events of homecoming that he realized he wanted to do more for him.

His mood lightens a little as he tells them, “but I’m glad he did because afterwards I really did try to be one. Even though I never apologized, I stopped ignoring him. I listened to his shpiels about what he did that day and responded. I always responded from then on. We talked about science and things he enjoyed; he would tell me about the nightmares, and I would help him through them. Brought him over to the compound once or twice. Calmed his aunt down when she found out about his nighttime activities. We start to really form a relationship, a mentorship. We even took an ‘internship’ picture as proof for his classmates.”

That was the last happy memory he had of him. Now his smile drops, and his voice becomes somber again, “but then he goes and follows me onto that goddamn spaceship. I was so scared for him. I tried to send him home, but he stayed anyway because that’s who he is. I called him a stowaway and told him to ‘let the adults talk.’ Going back to my old habits, which I do when I'm scared. I didn’t know how to express the fact that it wasn’t that I didn’t want him next to me or fighting alongside me. It was I didn’t want him in space. The place that has haunted my dreams since the Battle of New York.”

The team turned to look at each other and then at Rhody and Pepper at this point. They never knew, never realized, how deep those scars ran.

“We get to Titan to try and catch and surprise Thanos on his own turf and we somehow meet up with the “Guardians of The Galaxy.” Tony questions if he got the name right, so he looks at the raccoon for confirmation, who nods. “Then this kid. God, this kid is so tenacious. He helps come up with this plan to fight Thanos.” Tony’s voice picks up the pace and you can feel the ‘action sequence’ of it all. “And he is executing it so well, and we are working so in sync and we are seconds away from pulling the gauntlet off of Thanos”, he pauses, “but something goes wrong.”

Tony doesn’t tell them about what Quill did, he doesn’t want to paint him in a bad light. As angry as he was at him, he understands, hell Tony probably would have done the same thing.

“Then everyone started disappearing. At first, I think Peter looks fine, but I turn around for a second and then he’s collapsing in my arms telling me he doesn’t feel good.” His eyes start to water, he’s never cried in front of anyone other than Pepper or Rhody, but he guesses that’s the effect this kid has on him.

“The kid has enhanced healing, so his body is trying to stitch itself back together as The Snap is trying to turn him into dust. He’s begging me not to go, but I can't do anything to comfort him. What do you say to someone who can feel every second of their body disintegrating?” The entire team stays silent because there is nothing to say. “Everyone else got to go quickly and painlessly. But this kid, this innocent kid, who has been through so much already, has to be in pain. It’s just not fair. And just as he’s disappearing in my arms, he apologizes. Why did he apologize?” That part made no sense to him. “It wasn’t his fault!” he yells.

Clint is now forever going to look at Tony in a different light, realizing how wrong he was regarding what he said. Tony lost someone who he deeply cared about, loved even. A kid that he looked up to as much as the kid looked up to him. He still didn’t really understand why this kid looked up to Tony so much. He knows that Tony loved the kid, but the way he treated him, for what seems like the majority of their relationship, is a lot for anyone to put up with. But the kid must have seen the thing in Tony that he only now is just getting a glimpse at. The man behind the snark and walls miles high, the man with a heart of gold.

So he speaks up, not only as an apology but because as a father he understands. He knows why Peter apologized. “He was apologizing for leaving you.” He looks Tony in the eyes, “because he loved you.”

There's a second after he says that where the room is so quiet you could hear a pin drop. And just as quickly as that second came, it was over. Tony’s damn breaks. “Oh, God.” The words only heard through the crack in his voice as he breaks down and cries. Not just a single tear, but a waterfall. And everyone sits there, quietly, letting him cry over the boy, and the realization that he never even got the chance to say, ‘I love you’.


End file.
